Ayesha Khan, reporter on the Channel 4 documentary “Divorce: Sharia Style”, offers a balanced view of the operation of sharia courts in the UK.
For a rather less balanced view, see Johann Hari in the Independent, 11 February 2008
Qaradawi no hate preacher: UK Muslims
LONDON — British Muslims reacted Thursday, February 7, with dismay to the government’s decision to deny prominent Muslim scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi a medical visa, insisting he is no hate preacher but rather a moderation icon.
“Yusuf Al Qaradawi enjoys unparalleled respect and influence throughout the Muslim world,” said Mohammad Abdul Bari, Secretary General of the umbrella Muslim Council of Britain (MCB). “I am afraid this decision will send the wrong message to Muslims everywhere about the state of British society and culture.”
The British Muslim Initiative (BMI) lauded Qaradawi, chairman of the European Council for Fatwa and Research and a trustee of the Oxford University Center for Islamic Studies, as an “eminent” scholar. It regretted the government’s decision as “an unwarranted insult” to Britain’s two million Muslims. “The negative impact of this ban is no less than that of banning the Pope from entering any of the Muslim countries,” said Mohammad Sawalha, BMI president. “We would have to go as far back as the medieval age when scholars were hounded and vilified in order to find a similar retrograde decision.”
Faisal Hanjra, spokesman of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies in the UK and Ireland (FOSIS), believes the government made a wrong decision. “Dr Qaradawi is a respected mainstream scholar, well known for denouncing terrorism and related activities,” he said. “We shouldn’t let personal prejudices get in the way of allowing a respected individual seeking the best medical treatment.”
The British Muslim leaders regretted that Prime Minister Gordon has caved in to pressure from David Cameron, the leader of the opposition Conservative party. “After one year of indecision the Labour Government has finally succumbed to neo-conservative pressure,” said Sawalha, the BMI president. “It is regrettable that the government has finally given way to these unreasonable demands spearheaded by the Tory leader whose government had in fact allowed Dr Qaradawi to visit the UK five times between 1995-97,” said MCB leader Bari.
Islam Online, 10 February 2008
See also the letter from Ubaid-ur Rehman, secretary of the LGBT Muslim support group Imaan, in the Guardian, 11 February 2008
Islam attacked by both church and state
Islam attacked by both church and state
By James Tweedie
Morning Star, 11 February 2008
ESTABLISHMENT figures launched a spate of attacks on British Muslims this weekend, alleging honour crimes, inbreeding and seeking special treatment under the law.
But former archbishop of Canterbury George Carey accused his beleaguered successor Dr Rowan Williams of “overstating the case for accommodating Islamic legal codes.”
The former head of Britain’s official state religion added: “He may have done us a great favour by airing this whole area of controversy before demand builds among Muslim communities for special provision in British law.
“Some opinion polls have the number of British Muslims wanting to live under sharia law as high as 60 per cent,” Lord Carey claimed.
Despite his opinion that “most Muslims are heartily sick of being in the spotlight,” Lord Carey expressed hope that Britain’s sharia councils, which settle minor disputes without recourse to the civil courts, would be subjected to renewed public attention. “A public debate might bring this country’s existing sharia councils under public scrutiny to ensure that they operate under British law,” he said.
In an echo of Enoch Powell’s infamous ‘rivers of blood’ speech, he warned: “Incorporating sharia tribunals into civil law seems a little bit like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut – and what it would do for social cohesion doesn’t even bear thinking about.”
Head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor added: “I don’t believe in a multicultural society. When people come into this country, they have to obey the laws of the land.”
Islamophobia ‘on rise in Netherlands’
The Muslim minority are facing violence and discrimination due to the new wave of Islamophobia in the Netherlands, an anti-racism group says. The findings were released in a report by a pan-European anti-racism commission, AFP reported.
The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) found that Islamophobia in the Netherlands had ‘increased dramatically’ since 2000. It also reported that Muslims were ‘disproportionately targeted’ by security policies and faced racist violence and discrimination.
The report went on to add that this was fuelled by events both occurring within the country and outside, such as the 9/11 attacks on the US. “The tone of Dutch political and public debate around integration and other issues relevant to ethnic minorities has experienced a dramatic deterioration”. It warned of a “worrying polarization between majority and minority communities.”
The country’s Muslim community of around one million – six percent of the population – had also faced “stereotyping, stigmatizing”, “outright racist political discourse” and “biased media portrayal”.
See also Associated Press, 12 February 2008
Mad Mel backs Carey
“The church should have the guts to sack the Archbishop … and pick a man who TRULY treasures British values”. So says Melanie Phillips. She applauds the stand against Rowan Williams’ abject cultural appeasement of the Islamic hordes by the likes of George Carey and Michael Nazir-Ali:
“What such critics understand only too well is the threat posed to this country by a brand of radicalised Islam, or Islamism, that wants to take it over. As Lord Carey said, Dr Williams’s comments will embolden those Muslims in their attempt to turn Britain into a country ruled by Islamic law which contravenes human rights. The only proper response to this threat is to say that not one inch of leeway will be given to it. But, instead, the Archbishop has gone down on his knees to welcome it. Astoundingly, he does not seem to understand that this country is being targeted by a pincer movement of terrorism and cultural takeover.”
Leo McKinstry – a suitable case for treatment
Over at the Daily Express, in an article entitled “Archbishop should fight for his faith – instead he surrenders to fanatics”, Leo McKinstry has clearly taken leave of what remained of his senses:
“It is bitterly ironic that the Archbishop of Canterbury, who should be leading the fight to defend our Christian heritage and democratic liberties, has called for the British legal system to incorporate sharia law. This is a religious code synonymous with barbarity, the oppression of women and contempt for basic human rights. All-embracing in its scope, often vicious in its sanctions, sharia is the very antithesis of the humane essence of Christianity, the faith that Dr Rowan Williams is upholding.
“… our civic leaders sneer at the Christian values that built our society but, in the name of cultural diversity, tolerate alien extremism, brutality, superstition and criminality….
“George Orwell’s novel 1984 painted a bleak vision of a future British state under socialist totalitarian rule. But today the real threat to our way of life comes from the onward march of aggressive Islamism. If the Archbishop’s vision were to become a reality we would have neighbourhoods in this country under the iron grip of bearded patriarchs and vengeful zealots. Off-licences and pubs would be forced to close in certain areas. Films and publications would be censored. Attendance at the local mosque would be rigorously enforced, while adherents of other faiths would be forced to convert or leave….
“It is grotesque that the Church of England should be colluding with this process rather than challenging it…. In his defeatist attitude Williams is turning the Church into a suicide cult…. His call for sharia law amounts to nothing more than a craven surrender to bullying from fundamentalist Muslims, whose demands are usually accompanied by the hint of menace from the clenched fist or suicide bomb….
“This is the classic stance of appeasement, hoping to buy the aggressor with endless capitulation…. there is nothing remotely liberal about an acceptance of Islamism. It is a bizarre paradox of our times that so called progressives should be eager to support an ideology that treats women as second-class citizens, condemns gays and condones rape, punishment beatings, corruption and mass murder….
“Sharia law is the logical consequence of the Government’s ruthless promotion of the cult of cultural diversity and mass immigration. That is why ministers are just as guilty as the Archbishop of Canterbury when it comes to allowing Islam to destroy the fabric of our nation.”
Breeding antagonism
Generations of my father’s family married their cousins. Headlines about “inbred” Muslims only serve to further demonise a minority group, argues David Shariatmadari.
Comment is Free, 11 February 2008
See also Andy Newman’s post at Socialist Unity. He writes: “Why didn’t Phil Woolas raise his concern about patterns of marriage among Jews? Or Hindus? Or the general population? Why mention the Pakistani community only? Unless this is informed by the continued mythology that Muslims are uniquely backward, and a threat to ‘our’ values?”
Archbishop: I won’t quit
The defiant Archbishop of Canterbury insisted yesterday that he will NOT quit or apologise over the sharia law storm. His spokesman said: “He feels this whole issue has been blown out of proportion.”
Dr Rowan Williams sparked uproar when he suggested that introducing Muslim laws into the UK is “unavoidable”.
The Archbishop has since been deluged with mail – “some very unwelcome and some very nasty,” said his spokesman. “He will explain his position tomorrow at the General Synod, the Church’s “parliament”. The spokesman said: “The Archbishop will not be standing down nor apologising.”
Sharia law is a code for Muslims’ daily life. Some Islamic countries punish adultery with death and repress women.
Dr Williams’s spokesman said: “He did not call for sharia’s introduction as some kind of parallel jurisdiction to the civil law”. The Archbishop, 57, preached in Cambridge yesterday where he was greeted with boos and applause. He left without commenting.
Synod member Alison Ruoff said: “He is a disaster for the Church.” But the Bishop of Hulme, Rev Stephen Lowe, said Dr Williams was “one of the brightest Archbishops of Canterbury”.
Boos for Archbishop of Canterbury at church
The Archbishop of Canterbury was heckled yesterday as he attended a memorial service. A few people in the small crowd which had gathered booed and one man called for him to resign over his controversial comments about accepting aspects of Muslim Sharia law in Britain.
Although Dr Rowan Williams didn’t respond to the hecklers outside a church in Cambridge, he posted a statement on his website in an bid to defuse the row. He said he “certainly did not call for its introduction as some kind of parallel jurisdiction to the civil law”.
Meanwhile police in Kent said the Archbishop had been offered round-the-clock protection, but had turned it down.
No blanket niqab ban: Holland
THE HAGUE — In a retreat from the previous cabinet’s plan for a general ban, the Dutch government has said it would now impose a partial ban on niqab in the western European country. “Face coverings are undesirable in an open society, they hinder communication between people and undermine equal chances for men and women,” Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said in statements cited Saturday, February 9, by Reuters.
He says the government will impose a face veil ban on its civil servants and in schools, and it will enter talks with public transport companies on adding a ban to their terms and conditions for passengers. The government wants clauses to the contracts of public employees forbidding them from wearing face-covering garments.
The cabinet has decided against a broad ban on niqab in public as that would violate the principle of freedom of religion. “Wearing Islamic face-covering veils is an expression of religion and freedom of religion can only be infringed in very special and specific circumstances,” Internal Affairs Minister Guusje ter Horst said in a statement cited by Agence France-Presse (AFP).
If the talks with other bodies like private transport companies fail, the cabinet can always introduce enforcement regulations, the minister said.
Shortly before being voted out of office, the previous centre-right Dutch government proposed a complete ban on niqab in public, citing security concerns. A new centrist coalition government of Christian Democrats, Labour and the Christian Union came into power in February 2007 and has taken a more conciliatory line on immigration.
Right-wing lawmaker Geert Wilders — who has angered Muslims with his fierce criticism of Islam — called the government’s reported retreat “very disappointing and cowardly”, according to the Dutch news agency ANP. Wilders sent a bill to parliament last July proposing a ban on niqab in public.